The thoughts, fantasies and random ramblings of Ashton Boatman Chris Leah, largely, but not exclusively, connected with his work for the Wooden Canal Boat Society, restoring historic wooden canal boats and putting them to work doing good deeds for the community and the planet.

Tag
beer

What is it about Wigan

Darkness was rapidly gathering as we tied the boats up and many
people were eager to head home. Others went looking for shops. John,
who had left the previous night, arrived in the van to give lifts
home, while others headed for the railway station.I was getting
concerned about the depletion of battery power on my ‘phone, so,
when we had eaten and those who weren’t staying had departed, I
suggested a visit to a pub so that I could plug my charger in. Fiona
and Carlos elected to stay and guard the boats, so Garry, Bex and I
went looking for a suitable watering hole. We headed towards the town
centre through a deserted wilderness of dual carriageways and light
industrial premises. We went under the main railway bridge and found
a row of shuttered shops leading uphill on an empty street. Among the
terraced shops was a small old fashioned urban pub. Inside, a silver
haired slightly unkempt gentleman was sitting on a bar stool and
conversing with the shaven headed manager behind the bar. There
seemed to be no other customers. We ordered our drinks and I asked
about charging my ‘phone. The manager pointed out a plug socket and
I connected my device to the mains.There was a billiard table in
an adjoining room and Garry was keen to play. I was reluctant to lose
sight of my ‘phone, but with so few people in the building and
being in sight of the manager I thought it would be safe.Bex had
disappeared to indulge her feminine obsession with washing and
preening, so I had to do my best to provide Garry some opposition. My
skills with a billiard cue are only slightly surpassed by my skill at
knitting, so the outcome of the games was a foregone conclusion. I
did manage to avoid any balls landing on the floor, but actually
getting any into the pockets was something that largely eluded
me.After a couple of games a glowing Bex re-appeared to provide
Garry with more of a challenge on the billiard table. I sat and
watched and enjoyed the beer and the lighthearted conversation. The
silver haired man left and, for a while, we were the only
customers.After a few games our glasses were empty and Bex went
to the bar. There was some commotion around the bar and then a tall,
hard edged but dishevelled man with tattoos and a shaven head entered
the room and sat next to me. He tried to strike up a conversation
about boxing. He would have been better employed trying to discuss
the mathematical equations underpinning string theory. I have never
had any interest in sport in general, but I reserve a particular
disdain for a sport in which the object is to cause brain damage to
your opponent . The man, who had clearly drunk deep earlier in the
evening, kept telling me that I knew various people associated with
boxing. I insisted that I had never heard of any of them.I sensed
that the friendly atmosphere could quickly turn through 180 degrees,
so I refrained from the sarcasm that always tempts me in such
situations. I mentioned that I lived in the next town to Ricky
Hatton. This impressed him so much that he hugged me. I was not too
perturbed by this, an excess of alcohol often makes men unusually
affectionate, however, as he started to nudge closer to me and sing
along with the love songs that were playing from wall speakers, I
began to get uneasy.Bex returned with beer, then went back to the
bar, I think to complete a conversation she had started with the
manager.I lifted my glass to drink and Garry did the same with
his. The over friendly boxer followed suit. “Isn’t that Bex’s
pint asked Garry”. “I’m not sure “ I replied. “It’s Mine”
asserted the boxing man, vehemently. I looked at the table and
counted the pint pots- one, two. I knew one was mine, and Garry’s
was alone on the other side of the room, so it looked very much as
though the other one would belong to Bex. I began to think that our
friend was angling for a physical encounter, either violent or of a
more intimate nature. Of the first possibility, I had no intention of
spending a night in either casualty or the cells. Of the latter,
well, it doesn’t bear thinking about. So far, Garry and I had
followed a policy of appeasement, but I knew that the man would keep
pushing this to provoke one of us into challenging him.Bex
returned and sat down. She lifted her pint to her lips. Garry pointed
out that she was not the first person to drink from the glass. Bex
put her beer down with a loud expression of disgust and asserted
strongly her rights of ownership. The man limply claimed it to be his
and told Bex that she was a lesbian. Rather than deny the assertion,
Bex stood up and launched into a tirade against the man, claiming to
be more extreme in her affections than even the ancient inhabitants
of that sun blessed isle but that didn’t give him the right to
drink from her glass. The brave boxer visibly withered as she pointed
out what a hypocrite he was, as he was obviously gay. The manager
came in as Bex continued her verbal assault, using every
colloquialism and euphemism for same sex liaisons that I’ve ever
heard. “Mind what you say”, said the manager, “because I am
gay”.Bex explained what had happened , and the manager, quietly
but firmly, ejected the boxer, who now looked greatly subdued. The
force of Bex’s wit laden tongue lashing had a more sobering effect
on him than any number of left hooks. The manager agreed to replace
Bex’s polluted pint. I suddenly remembered my ’phone and rushed
into the bar to check on it. I let out a cry of “me ‘phone’s
gone”, but the manager allayed my brief panic by producing the
missing item from behind the bar. He had moved it as soon as our
pugilistic friend entered the establishment.There followed an
interesting conversation about the difficult economics of the
licensed trade. The manager was a caretaker manager , employed by the
brewery to keep pubs ticking over between tenants. This, it seems to
me, is a much more sensible arrangement than the periodic boarding up
and refurbishment syndrome that seems to afflict so many pubs.Drink
drunk and pockets empty, we left the friendly manager to contemplate
his empty bar and ambled back through the mean streets of Wigan under
the pitiless glare of streetlights. Back at the boats, I carefully
examined the water level. It looked disconcertingly as though it had
dropped about an inch whilst we were absent. There was little I could
do at such a late hour, so I climbed into Lilith’s forecabin ,
dropped the bed flap and climbed into my sleeping bag.

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Chris Leah

For the last 40 odd years I've been messing about with old wooden narrow boats. I helped to set up the Wooden Canal Boat Society which has a collection of 6 historic boats which would probably have all been broken up without WCBS intervention. I've been involved in restoring "Lilith" (1901) "Forget me Not" (1927" and "Hazel" (1913) and am currently skippering "Hazel" as a well being boat providing trips and holidays for people who need their spirits raising.